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Diablo II: Lord of Destruction
Blazemonger writes "There's a story from IGN on Yahoo! talking about Blizzard recruiting for the upcoming expansion beta test.
" I just filled out my form - have you? And I'd just like to reiterate my willingness to beta-test. Blizzard. I'm willing. So's CowboyNeal.
What about Linux isn't beta?
Plain and simple, it's an action game, an iso-shooter. And to add insult to injury, it's still very much a find-key-and-open-doors type of game. You run around completing straight-forward quests, and progress to the next one in an extremely predictable, linear manner. Anyone who thinks Diablo is an RPG would be sorely mistaken and does great injustice to the genre.
"Hot lesbian witches! It's fucking genius!"
As said by others, Diablo is a totally different beast from FPS like Unreal. I heard on the radio recently that videogames stimulate the brain in the same way cigarettes do. That would explain my cravings for Diablo and Fallout Tactics!
It's all about being rewarded for what, on the surface, is a repetitive behaviour. Like real life work, but more control, and better rewards.
As long as you don't sink into the "it's only a game" funk, it'll keep you happy as a drug.
--
#19845
See this just pisses me off because I have been beta testing games since the early sierra days. The games are fun and all, but finding their holes and bugs, and knowing that I have a knack for breaking things people put before me is the awesome part. I feel as a consumer happy that I can draw up excellent bug reports to see a game come out in the end better for it.
If it spoils your enjoyment of the end product, then call yourself weak for not being able to wait for an end product.
This is why I like beta test screens and allow a general public technology test near the end.
Its friday, and I wanna go home!
-M-
"Life is all about strategy, mathematics and psychological perceptiveness."
Bullfrog uses you slappers for beta testing. There are a slew of game related companies that support the EU region.
On the total end of the stick, like anyone cares if someone can't participate in a 'beta' test.. You gonna cry for me? I'll play the violin.
Ooh I'm a stinker today..let me out!
-M-
"Life is all about strategy, mathematics and psychological perceptiveness."
Ahhh! Holy sh*t you talked about NWN hehe.. I got lucky during that time period, AOL messed up my account and I got all the hours I wanted for free.. then they had an issue with a player name and deleted my account.. was cool of them.. its ok though.. I got mine. hah..
;) ) I've helped run a slew of Mush's through the years those rock for RP..
These people have to realize that games are mocks of life.. People are stupid and cowlike in general.. There are those of us who know how to play a game and dominate it, in teamplay we are leaders or executioners, in solo we are fiesty as hell.
I play to win, I rally a team to dominate.. I get mad as hell at team killers.. oh I hate societies rejects..
I still play a MUD from occassion.. Still have wiz chars on a few of the top ones (Batmud anyone?
Hey, and I'm 6'3, 205lbs, 7%bf.. You really wouldn't think I am who I am..
The world is cool, games are an extension of our imagination and I can't wait for the time to create my own corp to add to the bounty.
Peace,
-M-
"Life is all about strategy, mathematics and psychological perceptiveness."
Because Nethack is several orders of magnitude more complex than diablo? And there would be a ridiculous number of graphics to make?
And what's this fascination with 3D? An isomorphic view is much better for a game like this, where it is important to be able to see all around you. With a fixed view, you might as well make it 2d, since then you can make the graphics as detailed/pretty as you want.
The enemies of Democracy are
It's not a very honest question when you imply a hypocrisy exists without any substantiation. Especially since there is no way anyone here actually knows.
From my limited personal experience, I'd say that few people who believe video games should be less violent actually buy violent video games. The mentality seems to be "I don't like violent video games, so neither should you." Though I won't say this is a general rule.
The enemies of Democracy are
Everytime we see a post from Taco that contains a link to a QuickTime video we hear him whining "Of course, it doesn't work in Linux so I can't see it." Yet, whenever there's an article about Diablo Taco is right there chiming in "Oh I can't wait. Oh Diablo2 is great, I can't stop playing."
I can't believe I just noticed this... I just lost about a metric ton of respect for CmdrTaco. Not because he uses Windows (hell, I still play Baldur's Gate), but because he pretends he doesn't when he feels like sounding righteous.
Yes I know this was posted by Hemos, but just do a /. search for Diablo and you'll see what I mean about CmdrTaco.
This is not meant to be flamebait or a troll... just the truth. If I'm wrong please correct me.
FYI... Diablo 2 was up around 3 million copies sold last I heard.
Check out www.lurkerlounge.com. Sure seems to be an awful lot of strategy discussion going on for a game with no strategy... (grin)
Blizzard may be known for eye candy and quality game play, but they are NOT known for quality programming. Their code base is a serious mess. Given that they reused (cut-n-paste, not OOP) a lot of Diablo 1 source they probably couldn't get higher resolutions working properly.
Or complain about QuickTime movies because he "can't watch them" without a Linux player.
Check out Falcon's Eye. From the site:
And a screenshot or two.
Actually, the Diablo franchise sold 2.75M copies in 2000. Diablo was designed after Nethack. I still play Nethack today, roughly 12 years after I played my first game. Nethack has a lot of problems, but it is today still a *very* challenging game to win without cheating, and every game is quite different, even if you use the same character class.
People take for granted that most of Diablo's levels and magic items are randomly generated. This is a big deal. No other major games are doing random level generation by default, and few competing RPG's use randomly-generated magic items.
I believe that randomly generated quests are a plausible next step. In the future, I believe it will be possible to create your own character classes and that you will have clever, dynamic options for rendering of these custom classes. For instance, an 18-strength character will have a beefier musculature than a 17-strength character, and you will be able to see the difference. It is not hard to imagine a scale for charisma (bad hair, bad complexion, bad teeth, nasty facial expression that morphs smoothly up to perfect hair, perfect complection, charming facial expression, etc), or for dexterity (when doing your IK to get hand from point A to point B, dexterity could create an algorithmic flourish).
I agree that Diablo 2 gets tiring from the click-kill RSI-inducing user interface, but this is a user interface and AI issue that I think is solvable. For one, Diablo 2 did not allow the user to queue targets. This would not only make attacking simpler but would improve the multiplayer experience for people playing over slow, lossy links.
The Diablo games have short-comings, but it is the only modern game franchise I see pushing the limits of dynamic content generation, I think it has a lot of room to grow, and I wish it well.
I believe Blizzard's one major mistake is that they profess to be abandoning 2D engines. 3D engines have a consistent track record of not staying in the PC Data Top 10 lists anywhere near as long as the evergreen 2D engines. 3D PC engines are notorious for being flaky if you use a driver feature the driver author didn't expect to be heavily used. I believe that most strategic and RPG-ish PC titles, even today, should be 2D, because it makes market sense, the user gets a more consistent experience, and it gives the coder explicit, direct control of every pixel. There is room for 3D games, but the market is not as broad a reach because frankly, Microsoft botched the delivery of D3D and couldn't keep it simple, and the 3D accelerator IHV's flailed trying to add unique display features to their chips.
Surprisingly, Fallout Tactics - which was just released - is the first PC title I've played that used anti-aliased sprites. The result is gorgeous, and it works on every platform perfectly. When we did Abuse, we added dynamic lighting, an effect that wasn't terribly hard to do, but for some reason hadn't graced PC scrollers before, perhaps because someone thought it was difficult to use a lookup table to shade one palettized colour into another. It wasn't that hard, the effect was dramatic, and it worked on every platform.
There is a lot left to explore, and I think people forget that the power and grace of a modern computer is that it's a general purpose processor. In other words, it's always going to be slower than an ASIC (such as a 3D accelerator), but you will be able to enjoy your own, custom, unique, pixel-accurate effects.
I would fall asleep playing, wake up, and play some more.
Ha, that's so funny and true its sad. Its also part, I think, of why it's getting harder to sell games to adults. I know I still love video games, but I just can't justify spending 40 hours a week playing/learning them (or god forbid 120 hours like I used to). Today's games all brag about how they have "80 hours of play time" -- well, damn that pretty much guarantees I won't play it because I know going in I don't have that much time to spend.
I played Diablo 2 for a week straight, every night, then thankfully I forgot the disk at my brother-in-law's house and haven't played since. I remember having a great deal of fun playing, yet somehow my life does not feel less full since I stopped.
It's nice to play a good RTS or something every now and then, because you can play for just an hour (or three) and stop without having just "one more level"...
---------------------------------------------
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
The main purpose of the public beta is to stress test their servers. Therefore they want people in more or less the same timezone so that they will mostly come on during the same general window.
*sing* I'm a karma whore and I'm okay....
I work all night and I post all day
In Soviet Russia, hot grits put YOU down THEIR pants.
A minor, even offtopic point...CS is far from dead. More people play CS today than UT and Q3A combined. According to gamespy stats, anyway.
True, it may suck a bit more, but it's far far from dead.
I just wanted to say that we non US/Canada would be testers should be given the chance to work around this time difference. I know many who would be prepared to play games though the night!
Why? Why should you be given the chance to work around this? It's not like beta-testing is a right.
Blizzard wants to make the beta small and hit their servers fast and furious. They also want to limit the number of people who have access to the beta. Taking 2500 people from all over the world would probably not give them quite as good an idea as 2500 people from one region. Furtheremore, just saying "Well *some* of us could work around that" doesn't work because frankly, they can't require that you log on certain times of the day. The easiest way for them to get a good estimate of the server usage etc is to do it this way.
The problem remains, though, that D2 is simply behind the times. I played D2 and was, well, bored. The game's graphics and interface is dated, and even the storyline is kind of dull.
There's only so much you can do with a "click mouse until you kill it" game. Yes, it is better in multiplayer mode, and yes there are lots of improvements over D1, but it took so long to come out that it just can't compare to other games, such as Unreal. Heck, even Acheron's Call is close, and it has a much bigger (and more interesting) scope and multiplayer functionality.
Just my $0.02.
46. The Hobo smiles, his eyes glaze over, and he burps. "Beware the man who has lived longer than the Wasteland."
I signed up for the D2 beta first time around, and lo, fun was had. So I rushed (metaphorically, of course) over to the signup, and... the dropdown for country of residence includes only the US and Canada. Okay, I was born in Toronto, but I live inDublin. Whassup? Obviously I'm not going to refer to blizzard as bastards; after all, they gave use not only Diablo 1&2 and Starcraft, but I don't want to compromise may slight chance of getting a beta again.
But I'm worried.
My windows box exists only for Diablo 2; if Bill is reading this, he should note that if I don't get a beta, Microsoft lose a toehold in another house. Not that I'm trying to apply pressure, you lovely blizzard people.
Actually, one of the features of the DII expansion is the ability to run at 800x600.
On the other hand, I can't really say that a game like DII would benefit from an improved resolution in the same way that a FPS might. I mean, how much resolution do you really need to hack the living crap out of a blowgun-wielding pygmy?
--
Firstly, I won't even bother griping about the fact that registration to sign up for the beta test of an expansion pack of a MS-Windows game is considered newsworthy at Slashdot.
Secondly, I have to admit that I spent a good week and a half of my life dedicating most of my waking hours to Diablo 2, ending with my uninstalling the game in disgust and never playing it since. A number of reasons:
Ah well, I'm sure some people will enjoy the D2 expansion, if only the folks at Blizzard whose bank accounts are fattened by it.
As for me, I'll probably log a couple of hours this weekend playing Heroes of Might & Magic III (still haven't gotten tired of it, and haven't even tried any of the expansions), Test Drive Le Mans (Best. Console Racer. Ever. (DC)), and Go (the board game, since it gets me the heck away from the computer, and makes me use my brain).
I'm sorry but i have to include this rant in the discussion.
.. man US based companies can piss me off :)
WHY do game publishers hate europe? Every time a beta cycle is started, you have to be located in the US of A (and sometimes canada) to be able to apply. Do these people think we can download? We don't buy games? (asia + europe buys more games combined then the US).
It so pisses me off to see all these US centric game companies, as if we dont make up a large percentage of their profits.
I gues it's not bad enough we get the games weeks behind the US, we can't apply for beta programs either. Is this some f**king 3rd word country or something?!
Sorry had to do that
-- Chris Chabot
"I dont suffer from insanity, i enjoy every minute of it!"
Like I said, maybe it's just me.
But if expansion packs are news then I guess I should be submitting stories about the DooM and Quake maps I've been tinkering with.
. Quit playing Monopoly with Bill. Switch to one of many non-Microsoft products today.
*bite*
If you want to troll, at least get your facts straight. Blizzard releases for both MAC and Winblows. Last time I counted, that were 2 operating systems, not one.
Also, most Blizzard games are playable under Wine/WineX. The only thing that doesn't work well is Battle.Net support -- and it's coming.
Oh gee thanks! Now I have to pick all these FruitLoops out of my keyboard!
I don't have moderator points so I just gotta say +5Funny... that made my day. :^)
Ender
Nothing to see here
You contradict youself here.
>Just cause it sold a bunch doesn't mean anything.
So sales != good game.
>More and more people want something besides just hack and slash...
And how do they vote? By BUYING the games, thats sales.
Also by playing them. Thats why I said that there are 50K people playing on servers currently.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
Yes, buy the game as normal and play on their server for free.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
>The problem remains, though, that D2 is simply behind the times.
Diablo2 sold over a million copies. There are 50K players over 3 contenets playing. Behind the times? A good game doesn't have to be bleeding edge.
>but it took so long to come out that it just can't compare to other games, such as Unreal.
Unreal and Diablo2 are two totally different genres of games and you can't compare.
>Heck, even Acheron's Call is close, and it has a much bigger (and more interesting) scope and multiplayer functionality.
But you have to pay $10/month for Asheron's Call. Thats totally different.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
Actually the gameplay of Diablo is one of the best things about it. Their interface is decent and intuitive. It's much less dull than many games because you often have to judge when to use this power or that power, and often do so creatively. Two characters of the same class could have completely different styles.
CS is not dead. It has not died, it is not dieing. I have no idea where you got that bit of info. Maybe it's wishful thinking on your part. I still played after 1.0 (on hiatus now because of T2) and it was still the same basic game and still very fun.
About Tribes... funny that very few of the people online actually use teamwork. No, T1 did well because it was nicely positioned and an excellent break from the standard FPS games. T2 is selling out because it is a sequel. Never underestimate the selling power of a sequel. Do you think B&W would be doing this well without Peter's name being dropped?
Why? Slashdot is News for Nerds. Stuff that matters. Not everything has to relate to Linux... and who modded that shit post up?
Most people (me, myself, and I) are fans of Blizzard, and enjoy their games. And I think it is great that Blizzard does beta testings for their games, even if it is for them to stress test their servers, it opens it up to the public before it actually goes gold.
Here is the problem I have with it. I beta tests Diablo 2 before its release. It spoils your enjoyment of the game. It's great and being able to play a game before anyone else, but when you play a game that is well (I think) for online play, and you are playing with suck a limited crowd in a beta, you will get burned out. As I did, when playing D2 beta, I played it so much, that when it came out, and I got a the final release of the game, I was already burned out. There was no enjoyment really left.
Well, so I regestered for beta testing again, shoot me. I just love being able to say, "Ya, I am a beta tester, eat it!".
Its not what it is, its something else.
Its not what it is, its something else.
Too bad there isn't a Linux beta test :\
futang futang!
I bought Diablo 2 when it came out and played it happily for many weeks. Then one fateful day my roomate emerged through the front door media play bag in hand. "Ooh Ooh what's in the bag?!", I cried. "Everquest". After watching him wade trod around the MASSIVELY MULTIPLAYER 3d universe for a couple hours, I was on my way to Media Play to get my copy. Life has never been the same since then. I lost my girlfriend. I lost my job. Hehe, not really, but I have logged well over 100 hours developing my character, and I've found it much more stimulating than Diablo 2 ever was. Instead of playing with 8 people at a time, you play with 1500. Not to mention that there are countless spells, monsters, zones, etc. I guess it's all just personal preference, but I've never once had any desire to play Diablo 2 since.
A musician without the RIAA, is like a fish without a bicycle.
Haha! Great references. Mangar and Tyranthraxus really give me the warm fuzzies when I think about the great games of the past. The dog you reference, if I've got the right dog, is the best friendly NPC ever.
My friends and I played Diablo 2 for quite a while when it first came out. At least four hours a day, for about three or four months. We had a blast. Then something happened (can't remember what at this point), so we stopped playing for awhile. Then all of a sudden, we started playing again, at the same rate. Now we've stopped. I've no doubt that we'll start up again when the expansion comes out, if not sooner.
Diablo 2 is the first game we've ever done that for. Thats really saying something about the quality of the game.
--
Donald Roeber
Donald Roeber
Generating 2048 Bits of Randomness...
I got D2 about 2 weeks ago.
I have a boyfriend, and a career.
I beat it last night.
(Sorceress, 30th level, ice path, for those who case)
Am I just a mad D2 machine? Did I fall into some bizarre time warp?
Poor little no puppy toe!
http://quiz.ravenblack.net/blood.pl?3357354385
Generally, it's the Democrats and Pyschopath liberals who limit our free-speech and decry violence in video games.
Republicans (the decent ones) are the only people I lknow that don't have their head buried up their ass.
If they couldn't get enough beta testers in the US, maybe you'd have a point, but since they always get too many applications anyway, it'd be silly to go through any extra expense for the sake of getting even MORE applications.
Sorry had to do that... man Europeans who always think we're trying to fuck them for no apparent reason can piss me off :)
The only "intuitive" interface is the nipple. After that, it's all learned.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
They don't accept anyone not from their precious subcontinent for beta testing. I feel suitably offended
f.
There's another good example (one of the regulars of the Lounge): Sirian's Diablo II Page
Wait for Diablo III :D
Funny.. I don't have to reboot to play it. Perhaps it is because I run Windows Me on my primary machine and the Linux box is (literally) shoved into the back of the closet.
What Hemos and CowboyNeal didn't think about -- by posting the beta test invitation on /. they've created potential beta-test-invitation competitors, thereby lessening their own chances of being selected for the beta test.
It's supposed to be a stress test. So they are going to try to get alot of beta testers in one particular market, across only a few timezones. That way (assuming everyone has a similar lifestyle) all the beta testers will hammer on the stress test servers in unison, giving them the stresses they are looking for.
If you're on Windows, there's also Utumno, an isometric roguelike based on Angband. Unfortunately, the project has been dead for exactly three years today (how's that for coincidence?); fortunately, the source appears to be available and it's looking for a new maintainer ...
Diablo looks like it could be a fun game, but I cannot play it because the controls are just way too annoying. Oooh! Treasure, click it!. Watch out for that monster, click it! Click East to go East, Click on that guy to talk to him, Click Clickety Click Click Click.
That must be where their servers are. I could just see the engineers saying "Gee boss, the servers must be ready to go, we have 2,500 people connected from all the houses next door, and they're getting good ping times. Let's release."
Fade to one week later. Diablo sells two million copies across the world.
Fade to one week later, one hour later Why is our server crashing now? It was running so well during beta test?
You Diablo players know what I'm talking about
How many Republicans who decry violence in video games will apply because it's a cool game.
Same idea, different group. How many Democrats who applauded Lieberman will sign up?
This is not flamebait, this is an honest question about the hypocracy in the US's political system.
DanH
Cav Pilot's Reference Page
Cav Pilot's Reference Page
UNIX - Not just for Vestal Virgins anymore
In-Game Saves
---
This
I submitted this story two days ago. It was rejected. I totally love how the left hand of Slashdot has no fucking clue what the right is doing.
int break_spirit()
{
crush_nutz(left_nut,right_nut);
return(1);
};
--Life may have no meaning, or, even worse, it may have a meaning of which you disapprove.
"waking up sleeping dogs"
Oh well, i had to put SOMETHING in this article that was remotely Linux-based.
thelocust[dot]org
The Slashdot tag line(s) is this: "News for Nerds. Stuff that matters." That tag encompasses more than just Linux. If all you want is Linux news, there are a multitude of sites for you. And while I admit Slashdot has and always will have decidedly pro-Linux leanings("Debian is Jesus," CmdrTaco once said), there is much more to Slashdot than Linux. Here's just a few of the topics that bring me here many, many times a day. Space news. Movies. Science. Ask Slashdot. And yes, even video game news, such as the Diablo II beta. That's news for nerds. And that is stuff that matters.
I personally think D2 kinda sucks... My favorite Massivley multiplayer game is evercrack! Rashmi Dsai 28th lvl Shaman Prexus
I really think that this will be a good addition to a great game, adding 2 char. classes and all, I just wish they'd add more than just an Act 5, however i did hear a rumor that you'll be able to play it at 800x600? i cant wait!! -fohat
Is there heaven? Is there Hell? Is that a Tuna Melt I smell?-Primus
When Diablo originally came out I spent many an hour hacking and slashing away. It was frustrating at times having to run all over that stupid little town but the overall fun factor was there.
With the introduction of Diablo II, the hack and slash fun I remember in the original was back but it seemed that it was just more of the same. Granted, longer and with more characters and game play options but still I felt as if I could have reinstalled Diablo and gotten the same feeling.
The main and most glaring reason for this was Blizzards decision to leave the screen size at 640x480. While they did introduce some new graphical options with their 3d support, Blizzard has always been about eye candy and quality game play. While they at least hit for par in the game play area they sliced hard and lost their balls in the rough when it came to the eye candy.
To rant some more, I'm not sure what demographics they were studying when they picked out 640x480 as being the ONLY resolution for one of their hallmark games. The web has been standard at 800x600 (if not already at 1024x768) for a few years now. Some users might still run 640x480, but I doubt that if that was the case that they could even meet the min system requirements for DII let alone run it at enjoyably.
Bottom line, I played DII a bit, but after a while I just felt like I was back in the late 90's and better games were calling. Unless Blizzard fixes that my opinion will remain the same.
p.s. And for you hardcore linux geeks. Get over the fact that some ppl run Winbloz to play games.
Really, I know what I'm doing...Ohhhh, look at the shiny buttons!
I say go play Baldur's Gate II for a real RPG experience. The Sims, Unreal Tournament and No One Lives Forever are some other great Windows games.
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
I just retired a couple of characters on MUME recently...one had 27 days of play time, and the other around 20. Those were two, and at one time I had seven. I know that Everquest is addictive, which is why I will never play it. But for sheer mind-sucking addiction, free of charge, MUDs are still ranked pretty high in my book. I probably spent six months doing nothing but playing one game, over the course of four years.
Welcome to Blizzard. They dont put out crap for games, they canned Warcraft Adventures. Warcraft 1 and 2, Diablo 1 and 2 Starcraft, and 4 expansions. 9 products and they have been in buiness for 9 years now. That should say something for quality.
Sanchi
"They said we couldn't do it [Athlon]... but we built it, we shipped it... and we didn't have to recall it." Rich Heye
you can subscribe from 4 april to 11 april BUT only if you live in america or taiwan. That latest part make me wonder. How in the world can somebody in taiwan join be silly me in europe has no change at all....Why is Blizzard only accepting beta test applications from U.S. & Canadian residents? faq says: "Due to the differences in varying country time zones, we have decided to limit the test to U.S., Canada, and a small number of pre-selected cyber game cafés. " And since the CD will be mailed i can not work arround it. bummer. But maybe the cd will leak.....
But one of the reasons they gave is that they wanted to test what happend at different latency's. Well, if they want a lot of latency they include europe( that me). And why include some cyber game cafe's in asia?
June or July was the projected release date and all word from blizzard to date indicates that they are running on schedule if not slightly ahead.
Slashdot: Proof that a million monkeys at a million typewriters can create a masterpiece
If the time line for getting D2 out is any indication, the expansion will be out in 2004. I remember seeing a video of D2 in September of 1999 which, although in German, said that D2 was coming out in 3Q 1999. Boy did they miss that mark. My poor college roommate almost gave up waiting for it.
Check out Althea for a stable IMAP email client for X. Now with SSL!
Uh-huh. Of course, Slashdot editors will continue to conclude any story involving a QuickTime file with a smug, "I just wish they would release it in a format I could actually view."
And you guys wonder why developers aren't falling over each other to release quality Linux games?
Unsettling MOTD at my ISP.
It is actually inferior to the original in many, many ways. Blizzard worked on it for over 3 years and just couldn't get the job done.
The following is a repost from the Diablo Strategy & Tactics forum on battle.net, where I originally posted it to try to explain why I uninstalled D2 two weeks after I wasted my $40 on it.
(repost begins)
...The thing is, D1 was amazing for its time,
whereas D2 is very mediocre for modern times. D1's graphics were
top notch when it came out, and still have a nice feel of gritty
realism D2 lacks. D2's are just: "Oh... Er... Blizzard
obviously felt no need to bring the graphics into the new
millennium. Ok..."
Gameplay? Mostly the same. I suppose this is ok, except for the
insane "no level load" mistake, which hideously punishes
anyone who doesn't have 256 megs of RAM, a T1 connection, and a
hefty dose of blind luck. (Can you say, "Lagcore"? Can
you say, "Waypoint PK'd"? I knew you could!)
Sound? Improved very slightly, I'll admit, though my system,
alas, is sucking too bad to handle it now.
The whole skills thing is cool, and would be amazing if it
weren't so buggy and RIDDLED with apocryphal, inaccurate, and
missing information. Also, the ratio of usable to useless skills
has decreased a LOT since D1. In D1 the only spells I never use
are Inferno, Blood Star, and Bone Spirit; in D2 I can think of 4
or more skills in EVERY class I never use. If there is ever a
JG2, it will be about 100% more different from the D2 manual
than JG was from the D1 manual. Seriously. The only other
drawback is that one must rise to a very high level before the
game actually becomes FUN, in my experience - in that at level
20, if you're playing for power, you probably only have 2 or 3
skills to play with. Yay, now that's excitement.
Playerkilling... don't even get me started. Once again, Blizzard caters to 15 year old punks with bad attitudes by keeping playerkilling in the game. And then they do 10 million "balance" changes, as if pkilling in a fight where whoever sees the other guy first wins, makes any sense. At least they got rid of "ears". =/
The plot is semi-ok, except for the fact that the entire thing
was kept secret for about 3 picoseconds. Hurrah. The trouble
with the multiple towns is that I was unable to ever CARE about
any of them or their people, just as soon as I started to get a
handle on the various townies' characters I was off again, always
to the east...
Plus the tacked-on fourth act and the callous treatment of
Tristram's destruction really left me cold. I think Tristram's
destruction deserved an FMV more than Diablo's meeting with
Marius. I *really* would have enjoyed watching Wirt die.
>:) Of course, the absolute WORST, unforgiveable, thing
about D2's plot is that it trivializes your victory in D1. So
what if you beat Diablo? Your precious character failed in the
end, and so did Tal Rasha, and oh by the way we lied to you about
what the Soulstones are for. So there, nyaah. Gee, thanks
Blizz...
Oh, and the items... lots of good (though highly confusing to
the D1 mind) ideas here. The set items are, I think, one of the
only truly great improvements over D1, but the game does not
allow enough inv/stash space to store set pieces until you find
the rest, so instead you get people using set items like they
would any other rare. Oh well. It might have been nice to have
an extra stash with the general store owner in any town, like
having items "in hock" that you'd have to pay a little
fee to retrieve, but have like 20x20 more storage. Or something.
Add to this the buggy items, the weird items, the dupable (sigh!)
items, and the completely missing items... And the fact that it takes over 200 times the disk space of Diablo 1, for about 2/3 the fun value.
D1 had its
problems, I'll admit. Its buglist is also ridiculously long for
a game that's been patched so many times. But cmon, gimme a
break. I played D2 until I beat it in Open. A week later, it
was off my HD. Diablo 1 has never left. D2 is simply not worthy
as a successor, and if I tried to point to a reason for its
failure, it would be this:
Blizzard tried to do too much, and didn't have enough time or
resources left over to polish and debug. So some areas of it
shine, and the rest suck abominably. Oh, it's a playable game,
but there's no way it's on the level of Diablo. If they had been
a bit less ambitious (ie., if they had managed to put a sock in
their marketing guys before they could promise too much), it
would have been a FAR better game.
... and oh yeah. Serverside SUCKS. I'm amazed they thought it
would work.
(repost ends)
I've been playing D1 for years, and D2 just isn't worthy. The reasons it's more popular than D1 are:
1.) you can run - SERIOUSLY!! I know people who prefer D2 for no more reason than this! However, they fail to remember that there were much smaller distances in D1, and thus no reason to NEED running. Plus, D1 success requires tactical thinking, running (or teleporting) around like a chicken with your head cut off is an excellent way to get mobbed and killed. D2 is completely lacking in tactical or strategic thinking. "Put on magic items. Go click on monsters. WHEEEEEEE!" As a Diablo old timer, Pete, puts it, when there's no challenge then all the game is, is an hours-long mouse test. Have fun left clicking.
2.) It's shiiiiiiiny. Typical "newer must be better" attitude, plus a lot of folks have never tried D1. However, though the graphics may be better, they're not 3 freakin' years better. And the "atmosphere" has been lost... where D1 was gothic and creepy, D2 is cartoonish and dull.
3.) The Diablo patches. Blizzard has deliberately released a "patch" v 1.08, as well as several server patches, in a more or less successful attempt to kill Diablo 1. Before v 1.08 and the server patches, despite the presence of D2, there were usually between 5 and 8 thousand D1 clients online. Now it's a heavy day for D1 when there are 1000 clients on.
I'm sorry to be a wet blanket, but it's just been too many years since I've seen anyone at Buzzard do anything to deserve the great reputation they got off Diablo and WC2.
-Kasreyn
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger
If someone wants my account, assuming it's not yet deleted, it is:
username: $3crack password: ls300a
I had a level 60-something necro and barb, crapload of cool items. I finally realized how stupid and boring that game was. Now I'm playing Tribes 2.
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Know someone who is stealing cable? Report them!
Im impressed with hemos running windows.
Is this a real /. frontpager or are you just ensuring that you guys are in blizzard's good graces. Seriously do companies actually treat you editor types like you're tv celebs; if you mention jolt cola in an article do they send you a free case to your door?
Do what I did. I dropped Ameritech and went wireless all the way last year. Rates are pretty reasonable and the service is far more flexible. Plus you don't have to deal with their incompetence.
If you check the news and screenies at DiabloII.net you will find that in the D2X, Blizzard IS including an 800x600 resolution mode. Woot! The bad news is that most of the news abilities don't have much in the way of flashy graphics (Druid's summon and form change aside). For example, the assassin skills all look like the sorceress skills. Seriously, check the screenies.
Do you really expect to get to testing now that you have posted that here? ;)
Blizzard also develop a game that is in my top 5 all-time favorite games : Rock&Roll Racing. Dunno if I'd still like it but I spent so much time playing that game, I thought it rocked. They also released 2 Lost Viking games, which were pretty entertaining, and Blackthorn, which I never played.
That wasn't the best of ideas Hemos, There are going to be thousands upon thousands of people registering to test it now! Talk about crappy odds..
You really should have waited till one day after letest acceptable registration date =)
I sign up for every single one of Blizzard's betas and never get selected. The list always consists of 2,499 people from California and one person from Minnesota.
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silence is poetry.
fp? who cares, as a Brit I'm disqualified from this beta, though I'd love to test it. Ho-hum...
Life? Don't talk to me about life...
A classic example of why I post so rarely, this. Unfortunately, Peer Moderation depends on the moderator having: ;-)
The abililty to make informed value judgements;
A smattering of the language the post was written in;
and, in the case of this post, a discernable sense of humour
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Life? Don't talk to me about life...
I've been working with the beta-testing team on diablo three. So far it's fantastic!
Only problem is, when your character buys stock in the crazy demon "oh no I'm a princess, help me" underworld, the linux stock is always $1 by the end of the day. It's creepy.
I like Diablo, it's a pretty good example of Rogue for people who like pretty pictures.
[haven't you tried FunWithPerl?]
I heard that the new add-on coming out will add things like vampires, and singing swords, and a dog that will follow you around, and cursed potions, and sinks, and eight shrines, and a mage named Mangar, and the Hurkle Beast, and Tyranthraxus, and HURRRRK!
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